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Greymouth Star
West Coast feature
Greymouth Star
West Coast feature
Saturday, September 27, 2014 - 7
6 - Saturday, September 27, 2014
Shipwrecksand gold
Greymouth 1864 – 2014
AnillwindbuffetedGreymouthonSeptember26.1914.Whenthegalesubsidedandthesunrose,wreckagewasfoundstrewnalongthecoastline,fromPointElizabethnorthwards.Thecargo—chaffandboxesofbutter—hintedatthefateoftheKairaki,awellknownvesselbelongingtotheKaiapoiShippingCompany.Thediscoveryofalifebuoybearingthewords‘Kairaki,Lyttelton’confirmedfears.AsearchpartymadeasystematicinspectionofthebeachinthevicinityofPointElizabeth.Thenextday,hundredswentoutfromGreymouthandthebeachwasfurthersearched.Anumberofdeckfittings,anotherlifebuoy,aboxwhichwasfoundtocontainweddingpresentsbelongingtoRevMrMonaghan,werefoundlyingonthebeach.Bythe29th,wreckagehadreachedBarrytown.Thefollowingday,theshipwasfoundbytheharbourboardtug.Threeofthederrickswerevisibleabovewater,twoandaquartermilesoffPointElizabeth,andlyingin12fathomsofwater.“Fromherpositionitisapparentthatthevesselmusthavefoundered,andthiscouldonlyhavebeenbroughtaboutbytheshipbecomingunmanageablethroughanaccidenttohermachinery,”theGreyRiverArgusreported.“Thisdisposesofmanyofthetheoriesastotheprobablefateoftheship,andleavesnodoubtthatshebecameavictimtothefuryoftheelementslastFridaynight,orSaturdaymorning,whenshewas
probably in a helpless condition.”
Still no bodies had been recovered.
On October 5, the derricks, which
were 6ft or 8ft above the water, were
removed. On October 10 a diver was
sent down but he struggled with the
current.
On the 16th the Argus reported
the diver had subsequently found:
“Part of the ship was partially buried
in sand but forward she is practically
clear.
“The diver entered the engine-
room, forecastle and some of the
cabins, but there were no traces of
the bodies of the crew.
“The engine-room, after-hold
and other portions of the ship were
partially filled with sand, whilst a
strong wash caused the water to
continually rush in and out of the
holds, cabins, engine room, etc, with
the result that practically everything
had been washed out of the vessel,
and the hull is now almost devoid of
fittings and other gear.
“The deck was considerably
smashed about the deck houses,
funnel and boats were gone, and one
of the iron davits had been pulled
out of its position.
“One propeller appeared to be
intact. The only movable thing the
diver noticed about the hull was half
a pillow slip which had been caught
in a port hole.”
The last remaining derrick, which
was projecting from the wreck, was
drawn from its position and brought
back to Greymouth.
“The removal of this spar severs
the last visible trace of the Kairaki.
The last has been seen of the brave
little ship, and her fate will remain
as a grim reminder of the danger
to those who go down to the sea in
ships.”
But that was not quite the end
of the sorry chapter. On August 4,
1915, a man walking at Lyall Bay in
Wellington found a curry powder
bottle washed up on the beach.
Inside was a piece of paper with a
faint pencil message. At the time, it
was believed to be genuine.
It read: “SS Kairaki in a sinking
condition. Sprung a leak off
Greymouth. Big sea running, both
boats smashed and — drowned. I
don’t think she will —”
The officers of the Kairaki were as
follows: Captain W Scott, first mate
D Mclntyre, second mate S Trice,
first engineer W Arnold, second
engineer H Gittos, third engineer T
Noble.
Also on board were Marriott
Mylroi, 17, of Runanga, who was
taking a pleasure trip with his friend,
Mr Noble, the third engineer.
Mr Noble, of Runanga, served his
apprenticeship with the Dispatch
Foundry as did Mr Gittos.
Maritime disaster
SS Kairaki sank off Point Elizabeth 100 years ago today
One hundred years ago today, the 160-feet SS Kairaki sank off Point Elizabeth after leaving Greymouth port. Wreckage was found as far north as Barrytown,
but not one of the 17 bodies was immediately crecovered, even though a diver braved the wild seas. Almost a year later, a Wellington man found a message in
a bottle, allegedly written as the ship foundered. Last night, a crowd gathered at the Blaketown tiphead, where the Kairaki was waved off 100 years ago on its
fateful last voyage. LAURA MILLS scoured old newspaper reports of this maritime disaster.
The Kairaki
G
rey District
Mayor Tony
Kokshoorn has
been pushing the
almost forgotten
tale of the
Watson brothers,
as Greymouth celebrates its
150th year.
“The Watsons came down
from Buller on the Mary, the
day after Reuben Waite,” he
says. Waite, of course, was the
pioneering storekeeper who
set up shop on the banks of
the Grey River in July 1864,
right where DP1 now stands.
The Mayor believes that
by September the Watson
brothers were prospecting
along the beach, and soon
moved into mining. O ver nine
months with their two friends
they made enough gold to
bring in £7830 - $3.4 million
in today ’s currency. Or so the
story goes.
The story of their wealth
features in the 1939 book Old
Westland, largely discredited
by later historians, and author
Edward Lord does not say
where he got his information
from. He claims that by the
end of 1864, about 2500
ounces of gold had been
shipped to Nelson, and 1200
ounces of that was won in
the space of four months by
four men “working quietly” at
Watsons Creek.
They later cleaned up a
further 6000oz and returned
home to Ireland, Lord writes.
The newspapers of the day
give some clue, though of
course when the Watsons
were quietly making their
fortune, the West Coast towns
did not exist, let alone local
newspapers.
On December 8, 1864, the
Christchurch Press reported:
“There are men working in
all the rivers for 30 miles
down the coast, and some are
working close to the Grey,
in a small creek, and some
in a small creek three miles
south of the Teramakau
(Taramakau), called the
Cupeta (Kapitea) creek.”
On January 14, 1865, the
Lyttelton Times quoted from
a letter it had received from
a correspondent at Saltwater:
“The diggings extend for
about thirty-five miles along
the coast, and the farthest
inland for about thirty miles,
everywhere amongst dense
scrub. Very few are making
more than small wages.
Provisions are very reasonable,
as goods and stores are in
abundance.”
In December 1865 the
Hokitika newspaper the West
Coast Times, by now seven
months old, reported the
Watsons Creek rush. However,
that headline came 18 months
after the Greenstone rush.
“On Thursday a rumour
was in circulation that
fifty-eight pounds weight
of gold had arrived in town
from the Three-Mile rush
south of the Grey; and the
fortunate individuals who
brought it being those men
who first opened the beach
diggings, and created such an
excitement in Hokitika on
making known the first golden
result of the discovery.”
The paper’s inquiries revealed
that Watson and party had
placed in the hands of gold
buyer Mr Proctor 683 ozs
15 dwts (683 ounces, 15
pennyweight) of gold for
smelting, roughly retorted,
which when smelted yielded
the magnificent result of
674 ozs 3 dwts 6 grains.
At the newspaper’s request,
Mr Proctor hunted out
some of his old smelting
memoranda, which recorded
that this party the first time
they visited him, left gold that,
after smelting, weighed
1240 ozs 15 dwts 12 grains;
a short time afterwards the
crucible again being called into
requisition to purify another
parcel, which yielded 138 ozs
18 dwts 18 grains — those
quantities in the aggregate
weighing 2053 ozs 17 dwt 12
grains, at an estimated value of
£7830 7s 10d.
The report gives no date for
the earlier gold. However,
the return gave each of the
Watson party an average
weekly return of $23,800 in
today’s money.
***
The landscape today also
offers clues about the rush
along Greymouth beaches, if
not dates. Chesterfield Street
and Clough Road are two
examples of where a cut was
made through the terrace to
bring water to the workings.
In some cases, that water came
from Sinnotts Dam, where the
Marlborough Street bridge is
now, then down to the beach
to where the aerodrome is
today.
And nearby to this rich
goldfield, of course, is none
other than the Karoro
Cemetery.
In 1866 the newspapers
reported on the state of
the cemetery just north of
Watsons Creek, after the
Watsons had gone home.
There must have been gold
aplenty still and nothing was
stopping the miners: “(The
cemetery) is unfenced, and
around it on all sides the
miners are busily at work,
coming closer and closer every
day to the spot where the
graves are.”
In 1874, the Grey River
Argus reported the lead
was still being worked. The
Greymouth-Holitika railway
line had just been sur veyed
and one day people travelling
it would be able to discuss the
“thousands of ounces” mined.
At one point a 12 or 14ft
basin had been left by mining.
The passengers would “point
out the spot where Watson
and his mate washed out their
hundredweight of gold, and
first caused the rush.”
Greymouth gold
Fabulous gold discovery on town’s doorstep
When payable gold was discovered at Greenstone in 1864, a boatload of men disembarked at the Grey River and stampeded south looking for the new El Dorado. Quietly
working away closer to the new port were two Irish brothers and two friends. They made their fortune at Watsons Creek, Karoro, returning rich to their homeland. Today, as
people clambered all over the same beach digging for ‘gold’ as part of the Greymouth 150th celebrations, LAURA MILLS tries to separate fact from fiction about the fabulous
Watsons Creek goldfield.
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The Greymouth cycleway now traverses Watsons Creek.
Black sand mining at Charleston.
PICTURES: History House
Beach claim, West Coast.